Bbenzon

Humankind got its start on the African savannas some hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of years ago. At various times in our cultural history we’ve moved to distinctly new cultural ground, as it were. And so we are moving now, and have been for the past half century. This blog is how I see that move. Intellectually, I'm broadly interested in culture and the brain. Within that compass, anything could show up here. Literature and films (including animation), certainly, music as well, and graffiti. But, other things may show up as well. It's a blog, don't you know, it moves.
MY BLOGS
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New Savanna
http://new-savanna.blogspot.com/
Humankind got its start on the African savannas some hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of years ago. At various times in our cultural history we’ve moved to distinctly new cultural ground, as it were. And so we are moving now, and have been for the past half century. This blog is how I see that move. I'm broadly interested in culture and the brain. Within that compass, anything could show up here. Literature and films (including animation), certainly, music as well, and graffiti. But, other things may show up as well. It's a blog, don't you know, it moves.
LATEST ARTICLES ( 7205 )
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The State of My Research on ChatGPT (& LLMs in General) • [mini-ramble]
I recently posted a long report to the web: ChatGPT: Exploring the Digital Wilderness, Findings and Prospects. That report summarizes and reflects upon the... Read more
Posted on 07 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Time After Time, Sant Andreu Jazz Band
2023 TIME AFTER TIME ( Cahn / Stain ) arreglo Joan Monné SANT ANDREU JAZZ BAND dir Joan Chamorro featuring Luc Martin, trombon Koldo Munné, saxo baritono Lola... Read more
Posted on 07 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Queen Anne's Lace
Posted on 06 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY
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Gladiator II [Media Notes 155]
I watched Gladiator II on Netflix over the course of two days sometime last week. It was OK. Not sure it was as good as Gladiator, which I saw in a theater and... Read more
Posted on 06 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Federal Government Hoisted on Its Own Petard by #Elonald
Henry Farrell, Abraham L. Newman, Elon Musk Weaponizes the Government, Lawfare, February 5, 2025. It’s hard for politicians and journalists to grasp what Musk... Read more
Posted on 06 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Sunrise in Newport Harbor, Jersey City, December 2007
Posted on 05 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY
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From LLM Mechanisms to Ring-composition: A Conversation with Claude 3.5
I've published a new working paper. Title above, links, abstract, TOC, and Prefatory remarks below: Academia.edu: https://www.academia. Read more
Posted on 05 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Trump Proposes to Make Gaza “the Riviera of the Middle East!”
I kid you not. No, really, the Riviera of the Middle East. Writing in today’s New York Times, Peter Baker opens with: President Trump basked as Prime Minister... Read more
Posted on 05 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Simon & Schuster: "Book Blurbs? Who Needs Them?" [the Inside Skinny]
Elisabeth Egan, What Are Book Blurbs, and How Much Do They Matter in Publishing? NYTimes, Feb. 4, 2025. The famously fractious publishing community seems to... Read more
Posted on 05 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
What LLMs Are Good at
To make it super clear, language models are awesome. Otherwise, I wouldn't spend 9 months of my life working hours after my day job on writing a book on them. Read more
Posted on 05 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Claude 3.5 Sonata Compares Three Images Showing Visual Chaos and Makes Some...
This is the second time I've set out to have Claude describe two or more images. I've already done that in Claude 3.5 Sonata describes two different photos and... Read more
Posted on 04 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Andrej Karpathy: "Vibe Coding"
There's a new kind of coding I call "vibe coding", where you fully give in to the vibes, embrace exponentials, and forget that the code even exists. It's... Read more
Posted on 03 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Whimsical Monday: ChatGPT Draws a Picture of a Silver-Crested Swamp Swizzle
My father used to kid my sister and me about a bird he called a silver-crested swamp swizzle. As far as I know, it's a creature of his own invention. Read more
Posted on 03 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Into the Mystery [Indiana Jones Was Here]
Posted on 03 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY
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TNSTASFL, That Goes for Knowledge Too. OR: Why There’s So Much AI Hype. [once...
Why is there so much hype about AI? Sure, it’s new, it’s interesting, and certainly has transformative potential. That’s one thing. Read more
Posted on 03 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Is Trump Overextending Himself And, in Effect, Exposing His Flank? [Ezra Klein]
Ezra Klein, Don't Believe Him, NYTimes, Feb. 2, 2025. From the end of the article: The flurry of activity is meant to suggest the existence of a plan. The... Read more
Posted on 02 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
DeepSeek's Approach Only Works in Limited Technical Domains
If you look at their excellent paper code, the reward model is a logical function that was handcrafted progammed by engineers. Read more
Posted on 02 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Creativity and the Chatbot: GPT-4 Wins, for Now.
In a large representative sample of humans compared to GPT-4: "the creative ideas produced by AI chatbots are rated more creative [by humans ]than those... Read more
Posted on 02 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
What Do We Want from AI Agents? What Are We Likely to Get?
First, I present a Facebook post by Jonathan Mayhew, who teaches at The University of Kansas, about some recent frustrations he’s had using computers. Read more
Posted on 01 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Claude 3.5 Sonata Describes a Trio of Brass Musicians [on the 12/8 Path]
Lest you think Claude’s responses are rather concise, yes, they are. There was heavy web traffic during the chat. As always, my words are bold while Claude's ar... Read more
Posted on 01 February 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY